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Chinese New Year
马年快乐 (Mǎ nián kuàilè) — “Happy Year of the Horse!”
Happy Chinese New Year - the year of the Fire Horse! It's bound to be quite a year!
The Year of the Fire Horse appears only once every 60 years in the Chinese zodiac cycle, when the Horse sign aligns with the Fire element. While ordinary Horse years come every 12 years, this specific combination is rare, occurring in 1906, 1966, and now in 2026, giving it a reputation as an especially notable and powerful year.
In the Chinese zodiac, the Year of the Fire Horse is traditionally regarded as a restless, catalytic period when momentum outruns caution and events accelerate faster than institutions can comfortably manage. Chinese astrologers often associate this year with bold initiative, dramatic shifts in leadership, financial volatility, and heightened public emotion — a time when individuals feel compelled to act rather than wait. Fire intensifies the Horse’s already independent nature, so ambition rises, but so do impulsive decisions, making strategy and restraint especially valuable virtues. It is considered favorable for innovation, entrepreneurship, and breaking stagnant patterns, yet less stable for long-term security planning, partnerships formed too quickly, or speculative risk. The advice commonly given is to move forward, but deliberately: choose direction before speed, temper enthusiasm with preparation, and avoid reacting to every spark, because in a Fire Horse year sparks tend to multiply.
The Spirit of China Tartan is an emblem of diplomatic ceremony and cultural exchange. Red and gold reflect the Chinese Five-Star Red Flag and its five golden stars symbolizing national unity, while blue and white drawn from the Blue Sky and White Sun emblem represent the passage of time through twelve rays standing for months and hours and the ongoing flow of life. At the same time, those blue and white tones echo Scotland’s Saltire, intertwining the histories of both nations so that the Spirit of China! ❤️ 💛 💙 🤍 💜 🇨🇳 🏴 🔥 🐎
Chinese astrology is not just a zodiac of animals.
It is a calendar-based system that came from astronomy, seasonal observation, and a philosophy of balance in nature. The system describes the quality of time — what kind of energy dominates the world at a given moment — rather than predicting personality in a simple horoscope sense.
It is built from three layered ideas:
The 12 Earthly Branches — represented by animals
The 10 Heavenly Stems — represented by elements
Yin and Yang — the way energy expresses
Together they form a repeating 60-year cycle.
The animals originally represented phases of natural energy across the year and day. Ancient Chinese astronomers tracked the 12-year orbit of Jupiter and divided time into twelve segments. Animals were assigned because they were easy for ordinary people to remember.
Each animal describes a seasonal condition in nature:
Rat — the turning point of winter, hidden energy beginning
Ox — deep storage and endurance
Tiger — spring awakening and sudden movement
Rabbit — gentle growth and vegetation
Dragon — storms, clouds, and dynamic weather
Snake — warming earth and emergence
Horse — peak sun and maximum activity
Goat — ripening and maturity
Monkey — busy harvest activity
Rooster — gathering and closing of the day
Dog — guarding and decline
Pig — rest, dormancy, and completion
So the animals originally described cycles of nature, not human personality types.
The second layer is the Five Elements. These are not physical substances but ways change happens in the universe.
Wood — growth and expansion outward
Fire — heat and rising expression
Earth — stability and transition
Metal — structure and contraction
Water — storage and conservation
They move in cycles.
The generating cycle creates balance:
Wood feeds Fire
Fire creates Earth (ash)
Earth forms Metal
Metal gathers Water (condensation)
Water nourishes Wood
The controlling cycle prevents excess:
Wood breaks Earth
Earth absorbs Water
Water extinguishes Fire
Fire melts Metal
Metal cuts Wood
This system describes regulation in nature rather than good or bad forces.
Each element also has a polarity.
Yang — active, outward, initiating
Yin — receptive, inward, stabilizing
So there are actually ten element energies:
Yang Wood and Yin Wood
Yang Fire and Yin Fire
Yang Earth and Yin Earth
Yang Metal and Yin Metal
Yang Water and Yin Water
These are called the Heavenly Stems.
The animals and elements rotate together.
Because there are 12 animals and 10 stems, they only repeat in the same pairing every 60 years.
For more on Chinese astrology, click the fire horse!